Chapter 8: The Weight of Emptiness
-----Chapter 8 - The Weight of Emptiness-----
The Abyss was silent.
But not the silence of emptiness.
Not the silence of a void that had always been there.
This silence felt unnatural.
Like something was listening.
Like something was waiting.
Nyxen's grip on the bone blade tightened.
Something was wrong.
He could feel it—not in his body, but in the spaces between his thoughts. A presence that shouldn't exist, coiling around him, pressing against his mind like invisible fingers tracing the edges of his sanity.
Then—
"Wh… what…"
A flicker. A distortion.
"Do you… gaaiinn…?"
A voice.
Twisted. Strained. Wrong.
It wasn't sound. It wasn't speech. It was like the Abyss itself was forcing words into existence, grinding them together with the weight of something that should never have learned to speak.
Nyxen turned his gaze.
The eldritch still stood.
Barely.
Its jagged limbs twitched erratically, flickering between presence and absence. Its form pulsed, struggling to exist, its very essence unraveling.
But its head…
It was staring at him.
Not wildly. Not with hunger.
But with something else.
Something disturbingly close to understanding.
Nyxen's jaw tightened. He had seen creatures fight. He had seen creatures die. But he had never seen one do this.
"Spaa… ssppaaarr mee… outsss…iderrr…"
Nyxen's breath remained steady, but his grip on the blade hardened.
It was begging.
Not like a dying animal. Not like a cornered beast.
Like something that knew what death was.
And yet, there was no fear in its words. Only something deeper.
Something that made Nyxen's mind itch with a feeling he couldn't name.
"And why shouldn't I?"
His words cut through the stillness like a knife, sharp and deliberate.
The eldritch twitched, its unstable form flickering.
Then—
"W… whaaat… do you… gaiinn…?"
Not a plea.
Not defiance.
Something in between.
Nyxen stepped forward. His boots made no sound against the stone.
"By killing you, I gain power."
Another step.
"By sparing you… what do I gain?"
The eldritch went still.
As if, in that moment, it understood.
A low sound. A breath that wasn't a breath.
A response that wasn't spoken.
Acceptance.
It knew.
It had nothing to give.
And yet, even in its final moment, its voice came again—broken, unsteady, but carrying something beneath the distortion.
"D… do yyouu… ttruly… thhinkk youu… ggaaiinn…?"
Nyxen's fingers tensed around the hilt of his weapon.
"You're stalling."
"Rrr…memmberrr… tthhe llosst…"
His breath slowed.
"Ffeell… tthhe… emmmppttyyy…nnn…"
A sensation.
Not pain.
Not hunger.
Something deeper.
Something he did not recognize.
The eldritch's body twisted violently, its form struggling to hold together, as if something inside it was unraveling.
"Enough."
The creature's voice shattered—
"Thhhe vvoidd iiss—"
Slice.
Nyxen's blade severed its head in a single, clean motion.
Silence.
The body twitched.
Stood.
Then collapsed.
The Abyss took it.
Dissolving. Vanishing.
As if it had never existed at all.
And yet…
Something lingered.
Something invisible.
Something heavier than before.
Nyxen exhaled. His body felt no different. His strength remained. His blade remained.
Then why did it feel like something had been taken?
His fingers flexed slightly.
The weapon in his hand felt… colder.
The silence stretched around him.
Not empty.
Not peaceful.
Just wrong.
His thoughts coiled around themselves.
But there was no answer.
Only absence.
An absence of something he hadn't even known was there.
A faint glow.
Nyxen's eyes narrowed.
Buried in what looked like stone fused with flesh, something pulsed with a dull, dark red glow.
He reached down and picked it up.
The texture was rough. Cold, yet pulsing.
A heartbeat?
No.
That was ridiculous.
He waited.
Nothing.
His fingers tightened around it, expecting some reaction.
Nothing.
His mind roared with questions, but the Abyss was never kind enough to answer.
Nyxen exhaled.
He should stop thinking.
He should stop questioning.
And yet, the more he fought, the tighter the chains of his own mind became.
The Abyss was silent.
It never spoke.
But it never stopped watching.
He should have stopped.
But he didn't.
Nyxen kept slaughtering.
Every time he cut one down, the sensation was hollow. A fleeting satisfaction that died before he could even process it.
So he fought more fiercely. More violently. More desperately.
Not for survival.
Not for power.
But for an answer that refused to reveal itself.
And the more he killed, the more he changed.
Then—
A mistake.
A creature survived.
It turned to him, its form shifting, warping.
Its voice—if it could even be called that—slithered into his mind.
"You're... beecominggg… likee uuusss… oouutssider…"
Nyxen froze.
His breath hitched.
His mind went silent.
Like them?
He took a step back.
No.
That wasn't possible. Was it?
His hands clenched. He looked down at himself. His armor—was it always this dark?
His skin—was it always this numb?
How long had it been since he felt pain?
Since he felt anything?
His thoughts spiraled.
No.
This wasn't real.
This wasn't happening.
He wanted to deny it.
But the questions—the ones that had always been there—came crawling back, stronger, louder, unrelenting.
What am I?
Am I still human?
Was I ever?
Why am I still here?
The eldritch died with a final shudder, leaving behind silence.
But its words stayed.
Nyxen stood there, his heartbeat distant, faint.
He felt nothing.
No rage. No fear. No sadness.
He was finally empty.
Not just broken.
Not just lost.
He had become void.